Everyone is talking about Google's AI-powered game that guesses what you're doodling

Can a neural network learn to recognize doodles? Google intends to find out.

Google has always had a vested interest in developing and exposing people to the growing power of machine learning technologies. Their most entertaining way of doing this is through their A.I. experiments, which invite the public to explore machine learning by playing with pictures, music and language.

Their latest experiment, Quick, Draw! lets you play a virtual game of pictionary against a neutral network that will try and guess what you're doodling in under 20 seconds. You'll be given six words to draw. Once you start drawing, the A.I. instantly starts trying to guess what you're drawing — meaning the first guess is typically 'a line'.

It's a fun little time waster for us, but a valuable learning tool for Google's machine learning development. Once you've completed your drawing, you can go in and click your drawing to see the logic behind the scenes that the A.I. used to guess your doodle. You can then scroll down a bit further and see what other people drew for that word. Reviewing the other doodles, it becomes pretty clear which were drawn with a mouse, and which were drawn with a laptop touchpad.

The game has taken the world by storm, being shared far beyond the typical tech experiment. That's probably because it's actually really fun — especially if you're a terrible doodler, like a lot of us!

If you're looking for more fun A.I. experiments to play around with, you can find them all right here, including other experimental apps for Chrome and Android found from the dropdown menu.

I spent my years in grad school studying the philosophy of technology, particular emphasis on A.I. This recent trend by the market to resignify the meaning of what A.I. is to something no more simple than bits and pieces or small components of what might be intelligence is upsetting. This is not AI, not even close.